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Mortal Kombat (film series)
| based on = | starring = | studio = | country = United States | language = English | distributor = Warner Bros. Pictures | budget = $48 million | gross = $173 million }} 'Mortal Kombat' is an American series of martial arts action films based on the fighting video game series of the same name by Midway Games. Films ''Mortal Kombat (1995) Three unknown martial artists are summoned to a mysterious island to compete in a tournament whose outcome will decide the fate of the world. ''Mortal Kombat: Annihilation'' (1997) A group of martial arts warriors have only six days to save the Earth from an extra-dimensional invasion. Cancelled sequel Threshold Entertainment's production on a sequel was initially scheduled to commence shortly after the release of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, but it was shelved due to Annihilation's poor reception and disappointing box-office performance. It consequently never got off the ground as it remained stuck in development hell for over ten years, with numerous script rewrites and story changes, along with the 2005 destruction of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, which greatly affected one of the planned shooting locations. In June 2009, a bankruptcy court lawsuit saw Lawrence Kasanoff suing Midway while mentioning that a third film was in the works. Warner Bros. (which became the parent of New Line Cinema in 2008, after over a decade of both operating as separate divisions of Time Warner) ended up purchasing most of Midway's assets, including Mortal Kombat, the next month. In July 2009, actors Chris Casamassa (Scorpion) and Linden Ashby (Johnny Cage) separately announced that they would be reprising their respective roles from the original film, with Casamassa additionally claiming that filming would begin in September of that year, but the project still did not commence production, and aside from a poll that asked fans to vote on which major character they believed would die in the third movie, no official information on the project ever existed on the Mortal Kombat website hosted by Threshold, which itself permanently ceased updates in late 2004. Reboot In September 2011, it was reported that New Line Cinema (Mortal Kombat film rights holders), sister studio to Warner Bros. (current franchise holders), had hired Kevin Tancharoen to direct a new feature-length film with the intention of aiming for an R rating. Oren Uziel, who wrote Tancharoen's 2010 short film Mortal Kombat: Rebirth, was hired as the screenwriter while no actors nor other crew were confirmed. Reports stated that the film would not be an extension of the games nor Tancharoen's then-current Mortal Kombat: Legacy web series. Shooting was expected to begin in March 2012 with a budget of well under $100 million and a release date of 2013, but was ultimately delayed due to budget constraints, and Tancharoen started working on the second season of Legacy until problems with the film had been sorted out. However, in October 2013, Tancharoen quit the film production. In August 2015, James Wan signed on as producer, while in November 2016, Variety reported that Simon McQuoid was hired as director. Greg Russo announced on his Twitter page that the script is complete. In May 2019, it was announced that the reboot has entered pre-production and will be shot in South Australia for a March 5, 2021 release date. On July 9, 2019, The Hollywood Reporter has reported that Indonesian actor Joe Taslim is cast as Sub-Zero in the film. Producer Todd Garner announced on Collider Live that the reboot will be a Hard R rating movie and will be more like the games but nothing like the original and Russo confirmed that the film is rated R and will feature Fatalities for the first time on the big screen. On August 16, 2019, Ludi Lin, Mehcad Brooks, Tadanobu Asano and Sisi Stringer were cast as Liu Kang, Jax, Raiden and Mileena, respectively. On August 26, 2019, The Hollywood Reporter has reported that Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson and Lewis Tan joined the cast with McNamee as Sonya Blade and Lawson as Kano while Tan is cast in an undisclosed role. On August 27, 2019, Variety reports that Chin Han and Hiroyuki Sanada were cast in the film with Han as Shang Tsung and Sanada as Scorpion. Cast Key *A indicates the actor or actress lent only his or her voice for his or her film character. *A dark gray cell indicates the character was not in the film. Crew and other Reception Box office Critical and public response References External links * * Category:American film series Category:Action film series Category:Media franchises introduced in 1995 Category:Film series introduced in 1995 Category:New Line Cinema franchises